Before It Scales

Cyan Ventures
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Before It Scales is a podcast at the intersection of project development, policy, and capital markets. It's built for developers, investors, policymakers, and offtakers who are shaping Australia and the world’s clean energy transition. Each episode goes deep on what it takes to make a high-priority clean energy project bankable: not in theory, but in practice, and not just in Australia, but globally — drawing on the deal-makers, developers, and policymakers who have done it.

Episodes

  1. 6d ago

    The five non-negotiables for financing first-of-a-kind, with Julia Reinaud (Breakthrough Energy)

    Julia is Senior Director, Europe at Breakthrough Energy, the climate innovation network Bill Gates founded at the Paris COP in 2015. She has spent more than two decades on industrial decarbonisation, starting as an analyst at the International Energy Agency, then founding the Institute for Industrial Productivity and running programmes across China, India, the US and Europe, then building the industrial innovation programme at the European Climate Foundation. At Breakthrough Energy she built the organisation's European partnerships, including the fund with the European Commission and the European Investment Bank. She sits on the board of the Mission Possible Partnership. She joins Joy McConnochie and Shaun Chau to talk about what happens between a technology that works and an industry that exists. In this episode: The thread that connects a career: the IEA, the Institute for Industrial Productivity, the European Climate FoundationFrom analysing the transition to moving money into itWhat she believed early on that turned out to be wrongA narrow set of options, then abundance, and why the discipline now is prioritisationWhat Breakthrough Energy is: discovery, development, deployment, and why it is not a solo but a choirThe deployment era, and what it means concretelyWhy TRL 9 is not the finish line if your supply chain is at 3Not a sprint, not even a marathon: a relay, and the baton that keeps getting droppedThe 12 Keys to Scaling Up, and the ARPA-E test: if it works, will it matter?Why you cannot skip from pilot to first-of-a-kind commercial scaleOne balance sheet, four kinds of risk, and why that is the wrong place to put themPortfolios rather than projects, and why company building matters more than a single dealThe missing middle: too big for venture, too unproven for infrastructureSystem-level benefits, single-company balance sheets, and the mismatch between themThe European Commission and European Investment Bank partnership, and what blending actually solvesStructures that solve for the specific risk, and why the answer is not more moneyWhere the model stops working, and aiming for nth of a kindFive non-negotiables: crowd in rather than crowd out, demand-side tools, the discipline to reach the nth of a kind, permitting that helps, and cost and scaleAustralia's role, and five places deployment could startProject SkyPower For the projects, deals and policy shaping clean industry, subscribe to the Cyan newsletter: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/ Key links: Breakthrough Energy: https://www.breakthroughenergy.org/ The 12 Keys to Scaling Up: https://www.breakthroughenergy.org/newsroom/articles/unlocking-capital-for-climate-tech-projects-the-12-keys-to-scaling-up/ Project SkyPower: https://project-skypower.org/ Show notes: https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-7/ Watch the video:https://youtu.be/uivuIppTz2c

    The five non-negotiables for financing first-of-a-kind, with Julia Reinaud (Breakthrough Energy)

  2. Aug 24

    Inside the Green Fuels Accelerator, with Fraser Thompson (Cyan Ventures)

    Australia has at least twelve low carbon liquid fuel projects in development, around $19 billion of announced capital, and enough capacity between them to cover roughly 17 per cent of national aviation fuel demand. Not one has reached financial close. Fraser is Managing Partner at Cyan Ventures, a co-founder of Sun Cable, and an economist who spent nine years at McKinsey including leading the McKinsey Global Institute on sustainability. He runs the Green Fuels Accelerator, funded by ARENA and supported by Qantas, Boeing, Mission Possible Partnership and Climate Tech Partners, which is working with seven Australian projects to get them to a final investment decision faster and with better odds. He joins Joy McConnochie to talk about the Green Fuels Accelerator and the problem it’s working to solve. In this episode: Why $19 billion worth of projects has produced no financial closeMarket failure one: the missing demand signalLearning curves, and who underwrites the first projectFuel security, the Strait of Hormuz, and the tourism riskWhy blending means a 5 per cent low carbon blend costs less than a cup of coffee a flightMarket failure two: the $30 to $50 million development capital gapWhy a mandate on its own does not fix itWhy low carbon liquid fuels first, out of every clean industry sectorWhat a developer in the cohort gets, and the mock investment readiness committeeThe experts on the bench, including Natalie Lonergan and Oliver YatesWhy ARENA funded capability rather than a projectHaving an airline in the room while a developer discusses its offtake gapThe seven projects, and what the cohort was selected forThe Finance Readiness Assessment: surfacing problems while they are still cheapThree legs: development progress, FID readiness and transaction readinessThe six dimensions, and why any one of them can stop a financial closeThe long-term funding model, and whether this extends beyond liquid fuelsFuel security, Australian champions and regional benefit Key links: Green Fuels Accelerator media release: https://cyanventures.com.au/media-release-launch-of-green-fuels-accelerator-to-fast-track-commercial-scale-low-carbon-liquid-fuels/Solving for Offtake: Insights from the Green Fuels Accelerator webinar: https://youtu.be/ct3-iIfLy7AGreen Fuels Accelerator investor webinar, 27 August 2026: https://www.bioenergyaustralia.org.au/events/373861The Australian Government's low carbon liquid fuels consultations, submissions close 15 September 2026 https://consult.dcceew.gov.au/securing-australias-cleaner-fuels-industry-consultationShow notes: https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-6/Video: https://youtu.be/s972oxOmUsQ

    Inside the Green Fuels Accelerator, with Fraser Thompson (Cyan Ventures)

  3. Aug 11

    The three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of first-of-a-kind, with Dave Stribley (HAMR Energy)

    Australia takes 30 to 40 percent of its primary energy from liquid fuels. Dave Stribley's view is that we have barely started replacing them. Dave is co-founder of HAMR Energy, a low-carbon liquid fuels platform. He spent 15 years at ExxonMobil, ten of them on the Bass Strait assets and three in Qatar on LNG mega trains. He came back to Australia to help decommission Bass Strait, then left with Alex Smith to build HAMR. HAMR's flagship Portland Renewable Fuels project turns forestry residue from the Green Triangle into renewable methanol. A second facility in South Australia upgrades that methanol into sustainable aviation fuel. Total investment is around $1.8 billion, and the product is not yet a traded commodity. Joy McConnochie and Fraser Thompson cover the following with Dave: Leaving ExxonMobil, and the gap the founders saw in liquid fuelsWhat HAMR Energy does, and why HAMR Fuels existsThe Series A: Qantas, Airbus and thyssenkrupp Uhde as shareholdersPortland Renewable Fuels: forestry residue, hydrogen and methanolWhy methanol, and the commercial flexibility it buysThe hub and spoke model, and the limits of the mega trainFeedstock: the Green Triangle, and what comes after itThe BHP biofuel trial with Berge Bulk and GCMDThe partnerships that got the projects this farWhy a demand signal matters more than more supply-side fundingSulphur, lead, and valuing the externalityWhat a credible Australian demand mechanism needsThe Investor Front Door, from the insideThe three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of FOAKFinancing $1.8 billion in an undeveloped marketRisk, and the better conversation to have with governmentWhat first-of-a-kind changes, and what it does notAdvice for other first-of-a-kind developersSupply chains, ecosystems, and the China cost questionKathmandu to Everest: what Dave is excited about      For the projects, deals and policy shaping clean industry, subscribe to the Cyan newsletter: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/ Key links: HAMR Energy: https://www.hamrenergy.com/Investor Front Door: https://www.industry.gov.au/investor-front-doorCleaner Fuels Program: https://arena.gov.au/funding/cleaner-fuels-program/Not covered in this episode, HAMR has secured up to $32M in ARENA funding in July 2026: https://arena.gov.au/assets/2026/07/ARENA-Media-Release_HAMR_22072026_FINAL.pdfShow notes: https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-5/Watch the video: https://youtu.be/jE8M9ESdvMY

    The three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of first-of-a-kind, with Dave Stribley (HAMR Energy)

  4. Jul 27

    Backing the breakthrough: Mike Molinari on picking climate winners

    Most clean industrial projects start as science in a university lab. Someone has to back that science years before it makes a dollar. Mike Molinari does exactly that. Mike is the Managing Director of IP Group Australia, one of the most active early-stage deep tech investors in the country. IP Group partners with Australia's leading research universities, finds breakthrough science, and backs it from the university lab through to scale. Its Australian team manages just over half a billion dollars. Joy McConnochie sits down with Mike to open up how deep tech investing actually works. They get into IP Group's evergreen structure and why being "patient but not lazy" matters when a technology takes longer than seven years to mature, how the team backed Hysata's record-breaking electrolyser out of a University of Wollongong lab, the new $50 million Climate Catalyst Fund and why Mike thinks the AI boom is exactly what makes now the moment to back climate tech, and the first-of-a-kind funding gap that strands good technology between the lab and the market. We cover·       The IP Group model, and how it differs from typical venture capital ·       The evergreen structure: why patient but not lazy capital matters ·       Backing Hysata: spotting a record-breaking electrolyser early ·       Technology risk versus market risk, and the first-of-a-kind translation gap ·       The Climate Catalyst Fund, and why the AI boom makes now the moment ·       Decarbonising the mineral supply chain: lithium, and the copper tailings opportunity ·       Diligence with no revenue, and the red flags that make them walk away ·       Policy: Future Made in Australia, ARENA, and the need for stability ·       Keeping companies Australian while selling to the world ·       Unlocking institutional capital: super funds and the Hostplus model For the projects, deals and policy shaping clean industry, subscribe to the Cyan newsletter: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/ Key Links: IP Group Australia: https://www.ipgroupanz.comShow notes: https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-4/Watch the video: https://youtu.be/dO9IQY5LBxQ

    Backing the breakthrough: Mike Molinari on picking climate winners

  5. Jul 14

    Climate and energy policy for all, with Thom Woodroofe

    Australia has four million homes with rooftop solar and the highest penetration of the technology in the world. Renters and people in apartments have mostly been left out. That gap sits at the centre of Thom Woodroofe's new book. Thom is a climate diplomat turned policy strategist. He helped secure the Paris Agreement, advised former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in Washington, and built the Asia Society's China Climate Hub. He is now a Senior International Fellow at the Smart Energy Council. His book is Power, Prosperity and Planet: Climate and Energy Policy for All. Joy McConnochie and Fraser Thompson sit down with him to work through the argument that the climate movement won the case on the science but has not built the coalition to carry the transition. They get into how to make solar and batteries reach renters, why regional towns like Gladstone and Townsville vital to include, why Australia has no other industry (beyond the suite of new clean industries) ready to replace coal and LNG, and how to work with China without picking a side. For the projects, deals and policy shaping clean industry, subscribe to the Cyan newsletter: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/ Key links: ·       Show notes for this episode - https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-3/ ·       Watch the video - https://youtu.be/YWZzcZAekzs?si=3uljCDQ_d1TGmViW ·       Power, Prosperity and Planet, Monash University Publishing - https://publishing.monash.edu/product/power-prosperity-planet/ ·       Thom Woodroofe - https://www.linkedin.com/in/thomwoodroofe/ ·       Smart Energy Council -https://smartenergy.org.au/ ·       Future Made in Australia - https://treasury.gov.au/policy-topics/future-made-australia

    Climate and energy policy for all, with Thom Woodroofe

  6. Jun 29

    Inside the clean industry pipeline with Faustine Delasalle, Mission Possible Partnership

    In the last six months, 19 commercial-scale clean industrial projects reached final investment decision, worth USD $43 billion. That is more than double the pace of a year earlier, and 2026 is on track to be the strongest year yet for clean industry investment.  Faustine Delasalle is the CEO of the Mission Possible Partnership, the organisation tracking the global pipeline of clean steel, cement, chemicals and fuels projects. MPP recently released the fifth edition of its Global Project Tracker. Joy McConnochie and Shaun Chau sit down with her to work through what the data shows and what it means for Australia.  They cover why China now holds 45% of projects past FID and why that is hard to copy, why demand, not technology, is the barrier holding projects back, how Green Market Makers like H2Global bridge the green premium, the "5% tipping point" that turns slow growth into fast, and what Australia's 70-project pipeline needs to get moving. Cyan and MPP are building a Clean Deal Tracker for Australia together.  For the projects, deals and policy shaping clean industry, subscribe to the Cyan newsletter: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/  Key Links:   Mission Possible Partnership: https://www.missionpossiblepartnership.org Clean Industry Rising, the Global Project Tracker 5th edition: https://missionpossiblepartnership.org/clean-industry-rising-interactive-report/ H2Global: https://www.h2-global.org Show notes: https://cyanventures.com.au/podcast/episode-2/Watch the video: https://youtu.be/saRUMnrMBFw

    Inside the clean industry pipeline with Faustine Delasalle, Mission Possible Partnership

  7. Apr 28

    Introducing Before It Scales: 7 Myths About FOAK

    What is a first-of-a-kind clean energy project, and why do they keep stalling? The IEA estimates that about 35% of the emissions reductions needed by 2050 depend on technologies that aren't even commercially available yet. Australia has the endowments to lead on these projects. So why aren't they getting built? In the first episode of Before It Scales, Joy McConnochie, Fraser Thompson, and Shaun Chau take on 7 myths about FOAK. Why it's not a technology problem. Why strong fundamentals alone won't attract capital. Why grants aren't enough. Why regulation gets too much of the blame. Why Australia can't afford to sit back and wait. Why green premiums won't fall on their own. And why the window for action is shorter than most people think. Before It Scales is produced by Cyan Ventures: https://cyanventures.com.au/ Sign up to our newsletter for episode clips, show notes, and updates: https://cyan-ventures.beehiiv.com/

    Introducing Before It Scales: 7 Myths About FOAK
  • 7 Episodes

About

Before It Scales is a podcast at the intersection of project development, policy, and capital markets. It's built for developers, investors, policymakers, and offtakers who are shaping Australia and the world’s clean energy transition. Each episode goes deep on what it takes to make a high-priority clean energy project bankable: not in theory, but in practice, and not just in Australia, but globally — drawing on the deal-makers, developers, and policymakers who have done it.

Information

  • Creator
    Cyan Ventures
  • Years Active
    2026
  • Episodes
    7
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Cyan Ventures
  • Show Website
    Before It Scales

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